Yesterday, a woman from South Cameroon dropped to her knees before Prime Minister Scott Morrison pleading for the Australian government to help in a five-year war that has claimed the lives of eight people in her family.
The woman caught Morrison’s attention when he was addressing reporters in Rockhampton yesterday morning.
“I’ve lost eight people in my family,” she told 9News, referring to the Anglophone Crisis, also known as the Cameroonian Civil War, which began in September 2017. “The youngest one was 22-years-old, he was supposed to come to Australia and he was buried alive.”
“I asked [Morrison] if Australia can intervene to stop the genocide – if this thing doesn’t stop I will be left alone in this world.”
“They went into the street to protest … instead of the government listening to them, they sent in a helicopter and started shooting from the air. On that day a lot of people were killed,” the woman said.
Morrison kneeled down beside the woman to talk to her before she was escorted away by bystanders.
According to officials, violence in the region has escalated recently, with civilians caught in the cross fire and schools falling victim to attacks. The United Nations recently report that up to four million people had been impacted, with roughly 700,000 displaced by the conflict.